AUTUMN / FALL CHARITY RAFFLE

Regular visitors will be aware that the blog's main charity is "Help For Heroes", which supports wounded & injured Services personnel. This time the raffle will not only be donating to that admirable charity, but also to Wythenshawe Town FC.

The club are currently looking for local sponsors, as well as other donations. It will cost in the region of a shade under £1000 to equip the various kids' teams with home & away kits, plus training gear etc.

As my son plays Centre Half in the Under 7's, I'd like to try and help out. As such, I'm flogging raffle tickets at just a pound (£1) each, which can be bought via the blog Paypal "donate" link. (Please ensure you include your name & address for when the tickets are pulled out of the hat, well, large coffee tin actually!).

Prizes will include various music books of interest to blog visitors, including Pauline Black's recent autobiography, a Suggs / London book, plus various other titles, as well as CD's that have been posted over the months and a few DVD copies of "Dance Craze", plus some more surprises. I'll leave the raffle running for a bit & see how much we can raise.

Every donation / ticket sold will be welcome... The blog is, on average, attracting 2500 separate hits every day - if just one day's visitors bought a £1 ticket each, then we could equip the kids' team in full, plus send around £1,500 to the Services charity.

I'll obviously keep the readership up to date with funds raised & a list of winners will be posted in due course. I've got the ball rolling with £50 from my paypal / e-bay activities (no prizes for me - obviously!!)

Many thanks for your support. 

ARETHA FRANKLIN : Aretha Arrives (1967)

As is too often the case, a nondescript sleeve holds a fantastic album. To prove my point, check this one out... For Herr Pauli.

WYTHENSHAWE TOWN FC

Here's my eldest son, Dylan, who's just signed up to Wythenshawe Town (our local Club), as a Centre Half in their under 7's side.

BLUEBEAT 45's Volume 18

More Ska from Paul's fantastic ongoing series!!

Apologies for the recent lack of blog activity... work is going badly, (ie not as described & very badly organised) plus I'm (again) on the crap Tmobile wireless. As such, my downloading is limited to almost nothing, plus I can't access (or even see!!) the c-box...

In fact, as of now, I'm going back to my old job - better the devil you know & all that. Least it will help me through another, final year of college then we'll see...

DUSTY SPRINGFIELD : In London (Lost British Recordings)

A real classic here.... This compiles tracks from approx 1968 - 1971 that were released in the UK on the Phillips Label, though never made it over the Pond, as Dusty had signed to Atlantic (in 1968) and contractual problems stopped the licensing of the Phillips tracks in the States. I've spent several hours putting the tracks together from various sources and it was well worth the effort.

As always, comments are more than welcome.

...And here's a period clip of one of my faves (with live vocal) from the Tom Jones Show (1968)